The September 29 show at Toronto’s Opera House had a particularly fitting setup: two influential Chicago instrumental bands, Pelican and headliner Russian Circles, sharing a bill during a tour celebrating their long history of playing together. With no vocals to carry the songs, both bands relied on shifting dynamics, layered guitar work, and the contrast between quieter passages that forces you to really listen, while building tension into those heavier climaxes you thought you were ready for. The timing was especially significant for Russian Circles, who had just released their ninth studio album, Nine on August 28, almost exactly a month before this Canadian visit.
Pelican under very dim blue lights opened with Gulch before moving into Cascading Crescent from their 2025 album Flickering Resonance, which marked the return of founding guitarist Laurent Schroeder-Lebec to the band’s first full-length in 16 years and a shift into a lighter mood of the band’s usually darker tone in sound. The set continued through Lathe Biosas before Trevor de Brauw took a moment after the first three songs to reflect on the band’s history with Russian Circles, explaining that the two Chicago bands had been touring together for 20 years, “not straight — there were pockets here and there.” It was a nice bit of context before Drought, which Trevor introduced as a song from their first album, Australasia released back in 2003 that was treated with a wash of red light across the stage.
From there, Pelican jumped around back and forth through their catalogue via tracks like Ephemeral, Ascending, and Full Moon, Black Water before returning to Flickering Resonance with Pining for Ever and Wandering Mind to finish where they started. Ascending in particular had an interesting preface when a fan’s song request to play 2003’s Mammoth (a Pelican banger) was met with polite rejection and Trevor’s quick segue into “but we just released a new EP” before going into the titular track. Released back in January, the band’s been busy with this EP that includes 4 songs with one featuring Thursday’s Geoff Rickley. Before their last track, it was also heart-warming to hear Trevor take a moment to express gratitude not only for the Tuesday night crowd but also being able to play with Russian Circles and be a band for more than two decades. Stories of playing in DIY spaces, people’s basements, and even bowling alleys really highlighted the honour the band felt being able to still fill a place like Opera House. Overall, the mix of newer material and older favourites formed a strong set (despite no Mammoth), and the two bands’ shared history definitely added something extra to the occasion too.
With no mic on stage to be seen as Trevor forewarned, Russian Circles announced the start of their set with Arletta playing over the speakers, sharing those calmer sounds Pelican infused into their closer track that bridges the sets together nicely especially with the nylon-string guitar used in this song. On top of that, they opened with the same dim blue lights that set the table for Pelican’s performance as well – a little detail that might not mean anything, but perhaps a less obvious case of the continued cohesiveness between the two sets worth mentioning. Either way, it’s not hard to assume that the post-metal fans in the crowd will remain hyperaware of the rest of the show to come especially with the riffs and melodies that they know Russian Circles will plunge the venue in.
From there, the Illinois-based trio appeared and launched into Seventh Seal and E2, immediately putting the focus on their latest album, Nine. Released a month before the show, the record was featured quite a lot throughout the set, with Eluvial and Empath arriving later in the night, nicely wedged between older singles like the set had a cadence of an 11-course meal for fans to consume. Kicking things off with Arletta and Seventh Seal was particularly interesting being the last two songs on this 2026 release, not to mention the distinct polarity between the two tracks as well.
The band then balanced those newer tracks with material from across their catalogue, including Conduit and Gnosis from 2012’s Gnosis, Deficit from 2013’s Memorial, a fan-favourite Harper Lewis from 2008’s Station, Geneva from the 2009 album of the same name, and another Station legend, Youngblood. This stretch really showcased the consistency throughout their different eras and though each album was distinct, there was still a nice through-line which speaks to how well they understood their music and what fans liked, but was still able to evolve, keeping things fresh on both sides without making their sound unrecognizable. It isn’t easy, so executing a good balance between exploration and growth is just simply an incredible feat any band would hope to achieve.
Right after E2’s more synth-infused sound and Conduit’s unfiltered raw power, the line up of Deficit, then Harper Lewis, and into Geneva must have been the most brutal section of set. The 3-headed monster made up of some of RC’s hardest hitting singles were placed nicely in the middle of the performance as if it was served like an entree that fans easily gobbled up. Deficit just struck like a truck you were happy to get hit by, especially with Brian Cook leading the bass-driven breakdown that broke necks at Opera House. The band went straight into Harper Lewis from there with an extended intro, really letting the crowd sit in the tension as guitarist Mike Sullivan’s intricate guitar work and looping is on full display, complimented by drummer Dave Turncrantz’s unwavering rhythm and skill that never slowed down all night. The crowd exploding from Harper’s breakdown made it clear that all the momentum carried on from Deficit just had Toronto riding on a wave, setting up the super-heavy Geneva for an easy uppercut. Harper Lewis and Geneva were surely welcome returns to earlier eras, and was a great one-two punch that left fans on the floor.
Then the closing the run of Eluvial, Youngblood, Empath, and Gnosis showed just how well Russian Circles can move between atmosphere and sheer heaviness without needing vocals or stage banter to keep the room engaged. Despite Nine being the band’s most riff-forward release yet, Eluvial incorporated those same prog synths (akin to E2 earlier in the set) that felt inspired by Vangelis’ work on Blade Runner (1982), immersing you into this heavy techno-dystopian trance. A scratchy distorted outro from this track sent shockwaves across the venue and as the reverberations inside your chest faded out with the song, it contrasted well right into the guitar-focused intro of Youngblood.
Spanning 18 years back from their sophomore album Station, it’s a setlist staple that closed many Russian Circles sets in the earlier half of the band’s lifetime and for good reason. It has all of the heavy and intricate elements that caught fans’ ears from day one and it’s just as hypnotizing as ever within the Opera House walls. Its position as the 3rd last song in the set says a lot about how far the band has come since those earlier days too. Unapologetically using a baseball analogy, Youngblood felt like it was now positioned as a veteran relief pitcher that has passed on the duty of closing games in the last couple of innings to the newer superstars in the form of Empath and Gnosis.
Where Youngblood’s sound pierces through, Empath’s rumbles and smashes after it screeches into your ears. This Nine track feels like “classic” Russian Circles that reels you in with its crunchy bass intro before taking you on a ride with its mosh-ready breakdowns, and like a runaway steam train, it chugs through a doom-fuelled outro. Then with no lights and no warning, the trio kicked off the closing track with Gnosis, the track that shares the same name as their 2012 release and the latest to continue the trend of many titular tracks in their discography. Much like Youngblood, this 7+ minute track takes advantage of the eerie tension that Mike can execute on guitar to set the stage for the rest of the song. The vibe is reminiscent of the Call Of Duty: Black Ops Zombie theme Damned (if you know, you know) and this isn’t to disparage the track as some sort of copy of background music in a video game (in fact, Station came out 2 years before). If anything, this is yet another highlight of how well Russian Circles can build these complex soundscapes that can define entire moods like iconic video game soundtracks can do. And like many of their tracks, it closed the show by closing the song with walls of sound and a relentless heavy melody that asked for every headband to count as it escalated to devastating levels before a clean cut ending.
To sum the performance up, the newer songs really fit naturally alongside the older material in the set once again, making Nine just feel like another step forward rather than a departure from the band’s established sound. And with Pelican opening the night and the two groups sharing two decades of history, every show on this tour must feel extra special to both groups and fans that have been listening for that entire span of time. Every stop showcased the ripple effect of that historically-rich Chicago instrumental scene as well and how it was able to produce a couple of heavy-hitters that overflowed Opera House with their crushing sound. And with that, there’s no doubt that Russian Circles will keep showing that their music can still feel enormous, immersive, and completely absorbing, creating new ripples of their own.
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